


Dead, But Feeling More Alive With Every Passing Second!

by Lily_Star



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: AU where somebody ends up the astral plane, Also the apocalypse is pretty sad but you all know how that goes, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, But there will be grieving if that's the thing you're looking out for, F/F, F/M, Just a regular canon-typical amount of Major Character Death, M/M, Not tagging Major Character Death because I don't think it really applies as a TW to this fic, Nothing but sappy reunion after sappy reunion, Spoilers for Episode 56 and beyond, Temporary Character Death, The aforementioned grieving is like the only sad thing, You can either guess who or read and find out, god bless the transcripts
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-06
Updated: 2018-11-03
Packaged: 2019-07-07 15:49:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 11,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15911397
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lily_Star/pseuds/Lily_Star
Summary: The Animus bells' effects were immediate and devastating.Magnus' soul was forced out of his body and pulled to the astral plane.Taako casts magic jar and uses his strength to pull Magnus away from the rift.Merle summons their souls back from the astral plane to complete the rescue mission.That was in one reality. The one we all know and love.This time, someone doesn't roll good enough.





	1. Bad Luck

**Author's Note:**

> This is basically a novelization of the arms outstretched scene up until something goes wrong. With some additional descriptions of my own simply because I really wanted to meet that 1,000 words checkpoint.

“This place has always thrived because of, well, what else? Advertising!” Edward exclaimed, throwing his hands up for exaggeration and performance, “We’ve got a few consistent channels. Surely you received a brochure in the mail, or saw our billboards or met someone drawn here by a beam of magical light? Those are just a few tools of the trade, and they served us well during our residency here. But do you all know the most successful type of advertising?”

 

The three living glanced at each other before almost simultaneously saying; “Word of mouth."

 

“Magnus, you landed on skull in the last round, didn’t you?” Edward asks, tilting his head with faux curiosity.

 

“Yes,” Magnus states loudly.

 

“Bad Luck,” Edward smirks.

 

Taako and Merle both watch helplessly as the animus bell chimes and Magnus starts to spasm almost violently, a sudden light leaving his body before vanishing. When Magnus’ body finally relaxes he throws a foot back to prevent himself from losing balance, using Railsplitter to help stand up properly. Then, almost scarily casually, he looks back up at them with a small grin.

 

“You know, boys,” Magnus says as he holds Railsplitter up and twirls it around slightly, “I don’t think Wonderland’s that bad. You know, I feel like I’ve learned a lot about myself here, and I feel like our friendship has grown even more powerful, don’t you think?”

 

At that moment Lydia steps out from behind Magnus, or possibly not Magnus, wearing an elegant, black-and-white, Victorian-era dress and a large, devilish smile. Taako and Merle watch as Magnus smiles just as wide and a faint outline of Edward briefly appears, pictured as surrounding Magnus’ body.

 

“I think I’m gonna head to Neverwinter and tell everyone I meet to get down here to Wonderland ASAP! Lots of riches! More than I could even carry out!” Fake Magnus announces, using more hand gestures and pizazz than Magnus is known to use.

 

Taako and Merle give each other a quick glance as if to confirm that they both know what’s happening here. Merle sighs as he steps forward to talk to ‘Magnus,’ trying to get the lich twins to give them the Animus Bell.

 

Meanwhile, Taako is trying to figure out where the hell real Magnus is. He can’t be in his body right now or else he would’ve been putting up one hell of a fight with Edward. Edward may be powerful but Taako’s known Magnus long enough to know that the man has enough willpower to withstand anything. So maybe he’s not in there at all, like they took out his soul? If his soul got pushed out of his body then… would he be going where most detached souls go? Would he be going to the astral plane?  _ Holy shit is he dying! _ If Taako wasn’t panicking before then he sure as hell is now. Can he figure out a way to save Magnus?

 

“Yeah!” Fake Magnus says loudly, bringing Taako’s attention back to the conversation,  “I’ve got a way better idea, and hear me out, boys, my best friends. My very good best friends, Merle and Taako. What if you guys turn around and go back into Wonderland and I’ll keep the bell. And you’ll get to go back in there, but you’ll get to live! How does that sound?”

 

The wheels in Taako’s head is turning as an idea finally formulates in his head.

 

_ Get out of your body, rescue Magnus, kick some lich ass. _

 

“I got a fuckin’ idea for ya,” Taako says as his eyes go blank and he falls to the ground.

 

**~*~*~*~**

 

“Ahem,” Magnus says, pretending to clear his throat, “I didn’t say that.”

 

But he doesn’t say that, neither he or his  _ body  _ say that. Simply because souls can’t talk. Instead, he watches himself, no, Edward rant about how amazing Wonderland is with a body that doesn’t belong to him. All eyes are on Magnus. But Magnus isn’t really  _ Magnus _ right now, because the real mind of Magnus is drifting away from his own body, further and further away.

 

He’s not alone either, there are little, white, humanoid figures in this room with him that Magnus can see at the corner of his eyes. However, when he turns to look at them they scurry off and away from sight. They’re vaguely familiar but Magnus has no time to think about it since he has to deal with this  _ dying _ situation first.

 

Magnus tries to move towards his body but he can’t, something is holding, no  _ pulling _ him back. He turns his soul around only to see a rift. He recognizes it too from a few months ago. From when he, Taako, and Merle saw Kravitz’ portal to the astral plane. From when they caught a glimpse of the bright light from the sea of souls.

 

Except for today, there is no light. It’s covered in what can only be described as a blanket of darkness. Despite its unwelcoming state the rift still beckons for Magnus’ soul.

 

Magnus is frantically, desperately trying to swim away from the astral plane. He can’t die, he refuses to die today! He has so,  _ so, _ many friends he wants to protect, and right now his two best friends need his help in kicking Edward and Lydia’s asses. But right now, right this second as Magnus drifts into the astral plane, there’s nobody to save him. That is, of course, until he sees Taako collapse and his soul start flying towards Magnus.

 

Neither of them can speak as Taako grabs onto Magnus, hugging him from behind and trying to pull him away from the astral plane. Taako manages to inch them away but the pull of the rift is too strong for Taako. They’re both being sucked into the astral plane and the more Taako thinks about it the more he realizes that only one of them can make it out of this.

 

Taako can either return to his body, letting go of Magnus or Taako can push Magnus away and drift into the rift alone, technically killing himself.

 

Taako floats over in front of Magnus so his hands are on Magnus’ shoulders and his back is to the astral plane.

 

Neither can speak right now, but if he could, Taako would tell Magnus to give those liches the fucking stitches they deserve.

 

Magnus, after realizing what Taako was doing, would try to desperately convince him to stop, tell him that he doesn’t have to do this.

 

But neither of them can speak as Taako pushes Magnus right back to the catwalk and inevitably pushes himself straight into the astral plane.

 

The lid, holding the magic jar in Taako’s bag shut, falls off, deeming the jar empty.


	2. Something isn't right

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Magnus doesn't understand how magic works
> 
> ~*~*~*~
> 
> Taako's not scared, yet. Just curious.

Merle isn’t an idiot, he understands what’s happening right now. He also knows how he can help out. Merle uses his cleric magic to cast Planar Ally and focusses the spell on Magnus, hoping to bring him  _ and _ Taako back assuming they’re with one another at this point.

 

When Planar Ally is cast all is still for a few moments, the twin liches watching Taako’s body carefully, suspicious of what he might do, while Merle watches for any sign of life. Merle’s relieved when he sees Taako’s eyes blink open.

 

Wordlessly, Merle helps lift Taako up, which doesn’t help much considering the height difference but it helps him get to his feet and able to stand on his own again.

 

“You feeling okay? Where’s Magnus?” Merle asks, finally taking his hands off Taako after making sure he was standing properly.

 

“Merle I’m rig-” Taako cuts himself off, his eyes widen with the realization of  _ this is Taako’s voice, not mine. _

 

“Shit,” He says to himself, looking at his, no, Taako’s hand for clarification as a cloud of smoke leaves his mouth.

 

The lich twins perk up to this, delighted at the sight of suffering.

 

“What’s wrong?” Merle says, trying to read his friend’s face.

 

“I’m… not Taako, this is Magnus talking right now,” he explains, nervously rubbing his arm.

 

“So… Taako is where then?” Merle asks.

 

“He’s, uh, in the astral plane…” Magnus says, his eyes falling to the floor as smoke leaves his mouth again.

 

“H-how?!” Merle asks, smoke rising up again from his mouth as realization sneaks in.

 

“I…. Merle he gave his life for me and I can explain later but,” as Magnus says this he picks up the umbrastaff from beside him, the handle being almost uncomfortably warm, “We need to get some fucking revenge first.”

 

The twin liches are laughing their asses off like this is the funniest thing they’ve ever heard today.

 

“Gosh Lydia,” Edward laughs, still using Magnus’ body, “and I was  _ just _ starting to consider his job offer, it’s just such a shame really.”

 

“Yeah, he was just so lovable, it’s a shame he had to give his young elven life up like that!” Lydia chuckles.

 

“God! Just shut the fuck up already!” Magnus exclaims, smoke emitting with each word, pointing the umbrastaff at Lydia.

 

“Darling, do you even know how to use that thing?” Edward asks, holding up Railsplitter for a fight.

 

“I-I’m sure there’s some bloody button on this thing!”

 

Before any of them can do something, a large metal beam forms above all of them and begins to fall down, threatening to squash them. Then, even quicker and smoother, two human statues form and catch the beam with a loud crash. Then, they all see the red robe.

 

Their hands are outstretched to the statue, obviously having been the one who brought them into existence to catch the beam. Looking at the red robe you can tell that they are falling apart. Their form is glitching and sending off magic energy just like back in Refuge but they are refusing to give in, holding the statues there before sending them back into smoke with the beam.

 

The Red Robe, despite glitching like crazy, still looks at Merle and Magnus with a shaky thumbs-up before glaring daggers at the twin liches.

 

Magnus salutes the Red Robe.

 

“Hang in there buddy, we can do this!”

 

The Red Robe smiles weakly, despite not really being able to show facial expressions clearly.

 

Magnus aims the umbrastaff at Lydia, thinking about hitting her with a magic missile considering that’s what he’s familiar with seeing Taako use damage-wise.

 

Surprisingly, the spell begins to charge despite Magnus having never used magic before. Magnus tries to get the spell to fly at Lydia, but it stays on the umbrastaff like a growing water droplet. He tries shoving the umbra staff through the air but the magic missile still won’t shake off.

 

“I can’t let go of it!” Magnus exclaims, holding the umbrastaff in front of him like the over-powered missiles will explode.

 

On its own, the umbrastaff straightens itself out to aim at Lydia, not wanting to hurt Magnus’ body.

 

“OKAY NOW IT’S MOVING ON ITS OWN I’M A TERRIBLE WIZARD,” He yelled.

 

“FUCKING DROP IT, DUMBASS,” Merle yells back.

 

Before anyone can react, the missiles fire on their own at Lydia, all but one landing a hit on her and taking a good chunk of damage away from her.

 

After seeing this, the Red Robe finally starts to stop glitching out.

 

**~*~*~*~**

 

It’s a weird feeling, the feeling of gravity switching on you.

 

One moment, Taako is floating back into the astral plane, watching as he leaves Wonderland and the rift between dimensions closes. As soon as the rift seals, officially deeming him dead, instead of floating into the sea he’s falling towards it.

 

He turns around and immediately recognizes that something is wrong the body of water. He’s seen Kravitz’ portals a couple of times in the past few months and the sea of souls always looked so… mesmerizing. This time, however, it was in no way welcoming. It’s covered in what looks like an oil slick, blanketing the sea.

 

Taako has no time to prepare himself for hitting the surface of water back first, sinking further into the lifeless water.

 

He starts to panic, unsure of what to think of being dead under this void. Looking around he sees the souls of many others beneath him, all several feet below the water trying to distance themselves from the possible threat.

 

Taako is the only thing in between the surface and the souls like he’s left with a decision.

 

Taako doesn’t feel like swimming down to join the souls, he feels like he needs to deal with this hunger.

 

Wait.

 

Shit.

 

The Hunger.

 

How does Taako know that? He doesn’t want to stop and remember right now. He needs to figure out what the hell it’s doing in here ASAP. Taako swims to the surface of the water, reaching up to touch the Hunger. It attempts to push him back slightly before continuing on whatever path it’s heading towards. Taako floats down a little, distancing himself. If he needed to breathe right now he would take a deep breath. But instead, he goes straight to swimming up as fast as possible.

 

Using that advantage of a running-start, Taako fights his way through the Hunger that tries to repeatedly push him back down. He manages to push his hands through and then his head. The Hunger tries to push him back down but there’s no effort there, it’s not putting all of its energy into keeping Taako down.

 

Taako places his hands on top of the goop and pushes himself further quickly before his hands start to sink back in and flips forward, landing his back on top of the Hunger. He’s gotten his soul out but he’s starting to sink back in.

 

He kicks himself up onto his feet easily considering he doesn’t need to use energy up for that kind of stunt anymore. Now, instead of sinking in, he’s standing sturdily, like the Hunger beneath him has turned into a solid. However, Taako looks down to see he’s slightly hovering above the sea, probably a helpful quirk to being a soul.

 

While Taako is looking down, he can also see that the oil slick is moving in one direction, less like waves and more like a liquid conveyor belt. Taako, considering it’s the only clue he has as to what it’s doing, follows the Hunger to a spot it seems to be converging to, almost like a flat whirlpool.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I was writing the Wonderland P.O.V I pretty much completely forgot that Magnus has been Taako before as seen in the Camp Goodfriend live show oops. This is the fastest I've ever updated a fic at all like damn.


	3. Running Low on Options

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Magnus, thankfully, listens to the Red Robe's seemingly bad advice.
> 
> ~*~*~*~
> 
> Taako's starting to realize he isn't alone and that he never was.

Magnus has no idea what just happened. His face frozen with shock as he lowers the umbrastaff.

 

“What the fuck,” He whispers under his breath.

 

Lydia is still hunched over from the shot, walking back over next to Edward.

 

“Shit I thought you weren’t a wizard but there’s no way you could’ve sent a shot off like that without some experience!” Lydia says.

 

Edward readjusts his grip on Railsplitter.

 

“Let’s see what this baby can do!” Edward exclaims, charging at Magnus.

 

He swipes the ax at Magnus, wounding his shoulder before swiping again but this time at Merle, who flies backward from impact and lands unconscious.

 

Lydia starts charging up a spell but before she can fire it off, a wrecking ball manifests, heading straight for Magnus. But, before it hits, another one appears and knocks the other one off course so both wrecking balls fly away into smoke.

 

While Magnus watches the wrecking balls devolve into smog Lydia lands a Ray of Enfeeblement onto Magnus, splitting his damage in half successfully.

 

“Son of a bitch,” Magnus mumbles to himself.

 

The situation is not looking good, with Merle unconscious and the Red Robe busy learning to manipulate the smoke properly Magnus is left facing the liches by himself with half-damage and a rogue umbrella.

 

“MAGNUS!”

 

Turning his head Magnus sees the Red Robe calling out to him, using their normal voice and not their scary one.

 

“THIS IS GOING TO SOUND FUCKING WILD BUT BREAK THE UMBRASTAFF!”

 

“ARE YOU SERIOUS! MY BEST FRIEND  _ DIES _ AND YOU WANT ME TO BREAK HIS SHIT?!” Magnus exclaims, anger bubbling in his voice.

 

“I TOLD YOU IT SOUNDED FUCKING WILD! TRUST ME WHEN I SAY IT’S WHAT HE WOULD’VE WANTED!” The Red Robe yells.

 

Magnus sighs. He still has no idea why he’s trusting the Red Robe except for the fact that he might be one too. But there weren’t many options here. The lich twins were eyeing him down like lamb for the slaughter, Merle was out cold, and there wasn’t much he could do with half-damage and only using spells he’d seen Taako use before. Then again, Magnus didn’t think his actions out often.

 

Without double-thinking, Magnus takes the handle of the umbrastaff, which is searing hot with  _ anger _ and snaps it over his knee.

 

Without warning, fire emits from the broken handle and heads straight for the twin liches. With quick thinking, Edward uses Magnus’ shield to protect both him and Lydia. The shield, albeit getting burned up, successfully guards them against the worst of the damage. However, the flames are still hotter than hell and they get some damage shaved off because of the heat.

 

When the fire settles it reveals a figure. Another Red Robe. This one, however, is having a harder time staying in one piece. Magnus has never seen a lich glitch out  _ this badly. _ He had no idea if this Red Robe was still sane.

 

The twin liches stand up from behind the shield, glaring this new contender down with confusion and anger. The new Red Robe glares right back at them, magic energy whipping off their body constantly while they violently glitch out.

 

“I’m going to fucking kill you now,” The unstable Red Robe says, their eyes flaming with rage and their shaking hands holding fists full of fire. Their voice was altered to be more threatening, much like the first Red Robe had done in their earlier encounters.

 

**~*~*~*~**

 

Taako walks along the moving oil, keeping his feet lightly on the Hunger without actually stepping on it. Every ‘step’ sends off ripples in the sea and some small droplets to try climbing up his leg before he lifts his foot up and the droplets revert back into the stream.

 

Eventually, Taako sees the converging point where the Hunger seems to be going towards. A single point where the Hunger is swirling towards. It almost seems like it’s bubbling the way the small area is moving violently.

 

Taako skeptically walks towards it, unsure of what’s there. The Hunger seems more energized here, the goop making its way up Taako’s leg faster with each step. Eventually, the Hunger manages to land a drop on Taako’s bare skin. The feeling is too familiar. It triggers a memory.

 

_ The memory is far back in his mind, a moment from his childhood. _

 

_ He was about elementary-school age, a short while before Taako had to start living out on his own due to poor accommodations from his family. Taako was walking around a creek area, behind his aunt’s house. He was being a little risky, walking along the uneven rocks next to the running, shallow water, his arms outstretched for balance _

 

_ He wasn’t even watching his feet. His attention was further up, looking at the sky as the rocks beneath him threatened to slip and send him into the water. _

 

_ The sky was just too mesmerizing to look away from right now though. As a memory, it feels unreal. The sky was an unnatural light purple, nothing that shows in the sky from dusk to dawn, and there are two, overlapping suns. But after thinking about it, Taako realizes he isn’t remembering some kind of childhood fantasy. That’s how the sky naturally looked in his home. _

 

_ Taako remembers how instead of one of the rocks giving away his balance, his foot was caught in a slimy root _ , a similar feeling to the Hunger on his leg in real time,  _ and how he fell over, bracing himself with his hands, and rolled over into the creek before his arms gave way beneath him. He was not swept away since the water wasn’t nearly high enough, but he was soaking wet and probably scraped a knee or something. _

 

_ Being a small child, Taako was going to start crying because of his soaked clothes. But then he heard a worried voice from a kid about his age. _

 

_ “Taako!” _

 

As Taako remembers turning around to look at the other kid but then the memory fades back to static like it isn’t loading anymore. For the time being, Taako can’t remember the other kid yet.

 

When Taako’s snapped back into reality from the static, the Hunger has made it up to his knee. Taako immediately rips his legs out from the sea, the Hunger up his leg reverting back to the rest of the goop. Before Taako can sit down and analyze who the damn kid was, his attention is brought back to the violently moving water the Hunger is converging to and starts to hover cautiously to it.

 

Before Taako reaches the spot, a hand emerges from it, causing Taako to jolt back with surprise. The hand is immediately being covered by goop again but as it splashes down into the black waters the other hand rises up. Finally, the arm swings down and the figure pulls their head out from the water, facing away from Taako.

 

Even as the Hunger rises up their body to bring them back down, Taako immediately recognizes Kravitz as the figure.

 

Taako doesn’t have time to think, the Hunger’s dragging Kravitz back down quickly. Taako rushes in, running on the water so the push gives him extra speed despite the fact that the Hunger’s trying to grab his feet with every step.

 

Kravitz is almost fully pulled back into the sea of souls, his arm still outstretched while he tries to bring his other one out to the surface. Taako grabs Kravitz arm and immediately starts pulling on his arm, using all the strength his soul can muster.

 

The Hunger starts to crawl up Kravitz’ arm, trying to envelop Taako as well by slithering up his arms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can NOT write a single canon divergence without breaking the umbrastaff early oops.


	4. Two Sadistic Liches and Two Grieving Liches

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They don't know much about this new lich except for the fact they are fucking pissed
> 
> ~*~*~*~
> 
> Taako's problems seem to keep piling up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was hoping to black out the text to represent static but until I figure out how to do that it's just bold and strikethrough.

“Now, I don’t think that’s happening today, darlin’,” Edward says, getting the chance lance from behind his back and throwing it with deathly accuracy at his new opponent.

 

Before the chance lance lands itself in the unstable lich, Magnus interferes by knocking the lance away using the  _ flaming raging poisoning sword of doom's flat edge _ .

 

“No, I’m with them,” Magnus says, gesturing to the new Red Robe, “I think we’re going to fucking kill you.”

 

Wordlessly, the unstable lich charges up two more fireballs in their hands, the flames so intense it seems to be burning their hands and forearm away. Typically, liches don’t feel much pain, but this lich looked like the flames were tearing them up.

 

“ ~~**LUP** ~~ ~~**!**~~ ” The other Red Robe exclaims, static hiding their words as they rushing to their side.

 

The unstable Red Robes’ flames start to turn back down to normal at the sound of their voice, turning almost frantically to face them.

 

“ **~~Barry~~ ** **~~?~~** ” They say, their altered and threatening voice shaking with uncertainty in the static.

 

The original Red Robe scoops the second one up in a hug.

 

“Babe, please, keep it together. I can’t lose you again.” The first red robe pleas.

 

The second doesn’t say anything, their conflicted emotions working to bring her glitching down to a somewhat reasonable level, but she was still falling apart.

 

“I. . .” They can’t think of anything to say with these conflicting emotions of lost and found.

 

“Excuse me!”

 

Turning their attention, everyone in the room looks to the new arrival, Cam the floating head.

 

“Which one of you crimson wonders cooked up the door? I need to ask for a favor,” He asks the two Red Robes.

 

The original Red Robe floats forward.

 

“What do you need, bud,” They say.

 

“I need a healing game,” Cam says, motioning to Merle.

 

The Red Robe simply nods as they wave their hands around and use the smoke to create a pedestal from the earlier healing game. Cam gives one last glance at Merle before looking at who he thinks is Taako.

 

“I, uh, thought of something heroic to do.”

 

With that a Mage Hand appears in front of Cam which he slaps down on the pedestal, causing a beam of light to shoot up from the ground beneath the pedestal. The light consumes Cam and the pedestal, the pedestal disappearing in a puff of black smoke. Not long after, Merle’s one eye opens up.

 

Merle weakly stands up, alive but low on health still. He scans the area, taking in anything that’s changed.

 

“Pleasure to meet you,” he says as he waves to the new Red Robe, who slightly waves back as well.

 

Merle casts Prayer of Healing onto Magnus, healing him a good chunk of health.

 

Good thing Merle did that too because almost immediately after Lydia hits Magnus with a death ray. Magnus reels back, throwing a foot back before falling over and blood coming from his mouth, but he still has a few hit points in him still.

 

Magnus is still trying to avoid killing his own body beyond repair, so he puts the Flaming Raging Poisoning Sword of Doom back on his back and calls for the Chance Lance. Edward, realizing what Magnus is doing, tries to call the Chance Lance back for himself. For a moment, the Chance Lance is indecisive, barely budging from its spot. In an instant, however, the lance finds its place in Magnus’ hands.

 

Magnus charges at Edward, going straight for him. Edward arms himself with the shield of memories but just before Magnus touches the shield he side-steps and jumps around to the back of Edward, stabbing him in the back with a weapon blessed by the goddess of fate herself.

 

Before the lance even touches Edward a beam of holy light shoots into him, which is what ultimately sends Edward flying into the center of the battle. He gets up onto all fours.

 

“Huh,” Edward says before he topples over onto the ground, finally leaving Magnus’ body.

 

“Did you really think it would be  _ that _ easy?” Edward asks, chuckling.

 

It’s not long before the second Red Robe attempts to envelop the lich twins with flames.

 

**~*~*~*~**

 

The Hunger keeps slithering and crawling up Taako’s arms, now up to his elbows. Still, Taako stays determined as he pulls Kravitz up higher and higher from the sea, who is absolutely cloaked with the Hunger.

 

As the Hunger covers Taako’s arms whole and starts slithering around up his neck, he finally manages to pull Kravitz from the sea. Any of the Hunger that was on their bodies is now recoiling from being separated from the main body of water, hurriedly falling off Taako and Kravitz as it tries to retreat back to the sea.

 

Taako’s unable to stop pulling fast enough, the Hunger’s extra weight falls of both of them and the sudden lighter weight causes him to almost pull him and Kravitz to fall right back into the sea. However, before Taako’s back touches the Hunger Kravitz immediately pulls them upright so they’re now looking right at each other. Kravitz’ eyes widen as he finally fully-realizes who just saved him.

 

“T-Taako!?” Kravitz exclaims, being hit with a million emotions at once. He was happy Taako was here to save him but at what cost? It hurt for him to think it but Taako  _ probably died! _

 

There isn’t much time for a reunion considering the fact that the Hunger is starting to try and form hands to frantically grab at them, desperately needing to get the reaper back under wraps.

 

Taako makes an effort to kick a hand away and it falls apart like dried clay until it falls back onto the surface of the sea, reverting back into liquid and forming another hand fairly quickly.

 

Taako mumbles a silent ‘fuck’ under his breath, still unable to talk, and looks up at Kravitz with worried eyes and gritted teeth, silently saying ‘I’m all out of plans.’

 

Kravitz summons his scythe and swings it around, dissolving the nearest hands that have formed. He then grabs Taako’s hand and starts running, continuing to use his other hand to use his scythe and mow their path clean.

 

“We need to find some dry land, there’re islands in the sea of souls but I don’t have a clear idea on where the nearest one is so fingers crossed,” Kravitz yells back.

 

Taako watches as the hands they’ve left untouched in their mad dash begin to continue to grow into full bodies of all shapes and sizes that start running at them and he crosses his fingers for good luck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm starting to contemplate changing up the posting schedule, once I write enough chapters ahead of time I'll switch it up for two days a week instead of just Saturdays


	5. Getting Shit Done

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Magnus jumps back in
> 
> ~*~*~*~
> 
> Taako gets to speak

The fire surrounds Edward and Lydia violently, showing no mercy as the twin liches scream with  _ anger. _ After the fire burns for a second too long they finally disperse into thin air, leaving nothing but Magnus’ body, thankfully left untouched by the flames, and the animus bell.

 

“Holy shit,” the first Red Robe says under their breath, staring at the other in disbelief.

 

“Sorry, I uh, went a little overboard there,” the second one says, a glitch coming off their shoulder.

 

“D… Don’t worry about it, they kinda deserved it,” the first says, putting a comforting hand on the other’s shoulder.

 

Merle walks over to Magnus’ body and inspects the wound Magnus left with the chance lance.

 

“You sure did a number on yourself, kid,” Merle says as he gives the body a little shove for emphasis, “but I don’t think it’s entirely unfixable.”

 

“Wow, Merle, it’s almost like you’re a cleric or something,” Magnus jokes, laughing as he walks over to pat Merle on his grumpy little head.

 

“Or I can just leave your body to rot and you get to give up your exquisite fighter lifestyle for some magic you can’t use properly,” Merle says, shrugging his shoulders nonchalantly.

 

“I think I like the first idea better,” Magnus says, nervously taking his hand away from patting Merle’s head.

 

“That’s what I thought,” Merle laughs, “either way you’ll need to wait until I get my good spell slots back.”

 

“Leave it to me,” The first Red Robe says as they float over to Magnus’ body. The Red Robe summons a bag of holding and opens it up to reveal some diamonds, pulling out a few of them so they can cast revivify on Magnus’ body.

 

“Isn’t this, like, a death crime?” Magnus asks.

 

“Most of the time, yeah, it’s illegal. But trust me when I say that these are special circumstances.”

 

With that, the Red Robe crushes the diamonds and a magical aura surrounds Magnus’ body, only healing his wounds up to a reasonable amount of ‘not too fatal.’

 

“Okay mags, I’m gonna push you out of Taako’s body and you’ve gotta immediately jump into yours or else you might stay dead, capiche?” The Red Robe asks, going around to behind Magnus.

 

“Go for it, I’m ready,” Magnus says.

 

“You sure we can’t make this a little safer for him?” Merle asks nervously.

 

“Not a clue my guy, just try to catch Taako’s body!” With that, the Red Robe shoves his hands right through Taako’s body and although the other Red Robe and Merle can’t see it, Magnus stumbles out from Taako’s body, his feet planted on the ground.

 

Looking up he can see those white humanoid figures again, the ones he immediately forgot about after waking up the first time he saw them. However, just as quickly as he saw them the figures dash away again, nowhere to be seen.

 

Looking up Magnus watches as the rift to the astral plane opens up again, showing nothing but that unmoving sea slicked with what looks like oil. Before he can look any longer though he can already feel the rift slowly try picking him up again.

 

Magnus panics and without thinking it over he jumps straight into his body, saying goodbye to that fucking rift.

 

Then he wakes back up, looking up at the ceiling and immediately feels the pain of a  _ fucking stab wound in his back that has not been properly healed. _

 

“FUCK” Magnus screams, rolling over onto his stomach.

 

Merle sighs, gently putting Taako’s body down on the ground after catching it earlier and waddles over to Magnus.

 

“You got a boo-boo?” Merle asks.

 

“THERE IS A FUCKING STAB WOUND ON MY BACK YES I HAVE A BOO-BOO!” Magnus yells.

 

**~*~*~*~**

 

Taako and Kravitz are running from the Hunger’s crazed minions, which are starting to appear almost rapidly and as more and more various forms, from animals to people to actual fucking robots these silhouettes are gaining more and more speed as they all sprint towards the pair.

 

As they run Kravitz let’s go of Taako’s hand, still using the other to cut down the reappearing arms and is now using his free hand to reach into a small bag hanging off his waist, pulling out a small orb glowing light with a dim light.

 

“We can’t keep running, they’re getting faster,” Kravitz says as he does one last swipe with his scythe to the surrounding arms, “we’re going to need to keep them back with just a little more force if we want to make it to safety.”

 

Using their limited amount of time, Kravitz gently raises Taako’s arm before pushing the orb into it, which feels like cold air passing through Taako’s arm.

 

“I was planning on giving you this when we were in the clear but this will give you back most of your abilities, like talking and using magic,” Kravitz explains, looking up from Taako’s arm, which has no absorbed the orb, to look him in the eyes, “Good luck.”

 

Taako can feel his voice come back to him, the ability to say whatever he wants feels like a familiar warmth he took for granted. However, he doesn’t use it right now. Instead, he pulls Kravitz in for a kiss, a short but heartfelt kiss. It felt so nice, Taako almost didn’t want to pull away, but sadly the silhouettes closing in on them had other ideas.

 

“Good luck to you too,” Taako says after pulling away from the kiss, “let’s show them what hell is made of.”

 

Kravitz looks back at Taako with disbelief before smiling widely. However, his smile is swept away as his face transforms into a skull, readying himself for the battle as Taako starts charging up a spell in the palms of his hands.

 

“With pleasure,” Kravitz says as he raises his scythe up.

 

The Hunger’s minions are still charging at them, each one desperate to get the reaper back on lockdown, one of them mere inches away from swiping an inky sword at Kravitz.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey folks! Quick promo here I but in case you didn't know tomorrow is the start of Taakitz week and I will be participating for hopefully all of the days! So if you like what you read here please be sure to check out my up-coming Taakitz one-shots (One of which may or may not have a prologue chapter)! Either way, I'll see you folks next Saturday ^_^


	6. Where Do We Go Next?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Magnus is too stubborn for his own wellbeing
> 
> ~*~*~*~
> 
> The Hunger is too resilient as well.

“Can I stand up yet?” Magnus asked, who is lying on his stomach to keep the blood in like Merle suggested.

 

“Be patient, big guy,” Merle said, his hands slowly but surely closing up the wound on Magnus’ back, “give it a few more minutes.”

 

The two liches are side-by-side, barely paying attention to the two living, looking at the body of Taako. The second lich still hasn’t been able to keep their body completely stable. The other lich looks over to the bell that lies motionless on the catwalk.

 

“ **Lup** I’m sorry,” the lich says.

 

“Don’t be, you didn’t kill him,” the other says, looking over the first Red Robe now.

 

“Not directly, yeah, but…I feel like this is still my fault,” they say, staring directly at the bell.

 

The second lich sighs and puts a hand on the other’s shoulder, not knowing what to say after that. In that same moment, Magnus pushes himself up so he’s on all fours.

 

“One more minute, Mags,” Merle says, trying to coax him to lie back down.

 

“No,” Magnus says, “I’m fine.”

 

As Magnus pushes himself up, groaning in pain, Merle quickly latches onto Magnus’ back as he stands up. Almost like a piggyback ride but instead, one of Merle’s hands is determined to stay on Magnus’ back.

 

“Do what you want but I’m not getting off until this wound is healed,” Merle states firmly.

 

Magnus sighs in defeat before lifting his hands onto Merle’s legs so he won’t fall off.

 

‘Fine,” he says grimly.

 

Magnus trudges over to where Taako’s body lays motionless, as dead as can be, and takes in a deep, shaky, breath.

 

“What should we do,” Magnus says, turning his gaze to Merle on his back, “like do you want to say some prayers?

 

“Sure, I could probably say something,” Merle says, “but only after I’m done healing you first, kid.”

 

“I’m  _ fine  _ now, Merle,” Magnus growls, “you don’t need to prioritize me.”

 

“I’m not going to let you bleed out because you’re stubborn,” Merle says, “I don’t need you dying too.”

 

“I should’ve died though,” Magnus mumbles.

 

“Don’t say shit like that, Magnus,” Merle says, worry in his voice.

 

“It’s true though, I’m the one who got bad luck not Taako,” Magnus argued, tears welling in his eyes, “he didn’t have to… he didn’t have to come to save me.”

 

The liches float over to where Merle and Magnus are, to where Taako’s body is. The first red robe floats over to hover near Taako’s body.

 

“Is there any way we can take him with us,” the red robe asks, ‘I don’t want to leave him here.”

 

“What about his pocket spa?” Merle asks, “he probably would’ve liked that…”

 

“You sure you want to loot his body like that?” The second red robe says.

 

“I won’t take anything else off of him, promise,” Magnus says as he leans down to grab Taako’s bag of holding.

 

“How are we going to tell the others,” Merle sighs, “the poor brat’s going to be crushed.”

 

“We can cross that bridge later,” Magnus says, turning his gaze at the red robes after pulling out Taako’s pocket spa, “right now I’m going to need you two to tell us what the fuck is going on?”

 

**~*~*~*~**

The dripping silhouette inches away from slashing a sword at Kravitz is immediately sliced into two pieces with Kravitz’ scythe. However, as the silhouette’s upper body falls into a puddle that sinks back into the main body of water the silhouette’s legs are already building up with drops of liquid rapidly climbing up to repair the rest of its body.

 

“Shit,” Kravitz mutters as he realizes that they can regenerate.

 

Taako also has the same realization as his magic missiles blow holes into the body of the enemy shadows. Although most of them completely disintegrate into liquid the few that remain standing repair the holes in their bodies too quickly for Taako’s taste.

 

“Let’s keep moving, bones!” Taako calls out to Kravitz.

 

“Stay behind me!” Kravitz calls back as he starts running, slicing the rising minions in their path apart as Taako follows close behind, blasting whoever gets too close for comfort.

 

As they run the figures grow more and more furiously. In the beginning, Kravitz had to chop the arms out from in front of him like he was slicing grass but now the figures growing in front of them have gotten to the point of forming up to their waists before Kravitz sliced them in half. Meanwhile, Taako has to struggle with the fully formed figures that charge at them rapidly, blasting them repeatedly with magic missiles before they can reach them. However, their increasing speed has it so they keep getting closer and closer to them with every passing second.

 

When Taako looks up to their path he sees a far away stone building that’s ridiculously tall and lacking windows.

 

“Wha is that place?” Taako yells to Kravitz, picking up speed to run next to Kravitz.

 

“That? That’s the eternal stockade,” Kravitz says, “but I don't know if it’s the safest place to be.”

 

“You kidding?” Taako asks, “as far as I know necromancers are just a bunch of harmless nerds. It’ll be a hell of a lot better than this!”

 

Taako gestures to the horde of Hunger silhouettes chasing surrounding them. One of the minions tries to grab his outstretched arm but Taako instead shoots a magic missile at them.

 

“Okay,” Kravitz says, interrupting himself to swing his scythe again, “I can’t promise the prisoners in there will help us out but we don’t have any other options at this point!”

 

“It’s a risk we’ve gotta take,” Taako says, grabbing Kravitz’ hand, “whatever happened to your gambling spirit?

 

With that Taako channels a spell into Kravitz’ hand, the longstrider spell that effectively increases Kravitz’ speed by an almost significant amount. The moment the spell kicks in Kravitz picks up the speed, still holding onto Taako’s hand, and leads both of them to step on the head of a rising minion and run past the horde’s generating point that now has a tough time keeping up with them as they approach the eternal stockade.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm in a bit of a rush so I didn't really do a significant amount of rereading before posting so oops. I promise though next week there will be some good shit happening.


	7. Memories, Please!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Magnus and Merle have a one on one
> 
> ~*~*~*~
> 
> Taako and Kravitz find an ally

“Magnus,” the first red robe sighs, “you know I can’t really tell you all I know, but I need you to trust me.”

Magnus has a lump in his throat, one that wants to tell the lich to fuck off. But it never leaves his throat. Like he can’t bring himself to say it right now. Like the piece of paper that he got in refuge now feels like a weight in his pocket.

“I’ll get back to you on that,” Magnus says as he tosses the pocket spa up and watches it unfold into a door.

As Magnus lifts up Taako’s lifeless body with ease Merle’s eyes turn away from the horrible sight, opting to instead take a glance at the red robes.

The red robes are hovering side by side and watching them as Magnus marches them into the pocket spa. In fact, one of the red robes, the most recent one, moves forward slightly to follow them before jerking themselves back, almost unsure of whether to go with them or not. The other red robe uses their skeletal hand starts to gently rub their shoulder as some form as comfort. Then the scene disappears as the pocket spa’s door closes behind them, leaving Magnus and Merle alone.

Merle sighs as he climbs off of Magnus’ back as Magnus starts to rest Taako’s body on a nearby massage table.

“So…” Merle sighs, “what do we do now?”

“I… I don’t know, Merle,” Magnus says sombrely, sitting down next to Taako’s body.

Merle jumps up to sit next to Magnus, putting a hand on Taako’s cold arm.

“He shouldn’t have saved me,” Magnus whispers, “I should be dead not Taako.”

“You’re here now, aren’t you?” Merle says.

“Yeah, but I don’t know what I’m supposed to do now!” Magnus says, tears starting to stream down his face as his throat slowly starts getting clogged up, “I wasn’t able to protect Taako so how am I supposed to protect anyone else!”

“Look, Maggie, I’m no good at this advice bullshit but you’re still a good protector. I feel like Taako knew that,” Merle says as tears start to well up in his own eyes and he moves his hand to Magnus’ shoulders.

A sob leaves Magnus’ throat before he takes in a shuddering breath, his hand covering his own mouth to try and muffle it.

“Can… can we trust them? The red robes?” Magnus asks, trying to change the topic with his voice sounding like it might fall apart.

“I don’t know,” Merle says, “they don’t seem all that bad. Taako’s death seems to have them quite literally shaken up.”

“Well,” Magnus says, wiping his face clean with his sleeve before reaching into his pocket to grab that heavy piece of paper, “there’s also this.”

Magnus hands Merle the paper, still using the palm of his other hand to wipe his own tears away. Merle accepts the paper with unsteady hands, looking over the drawing of the original draft for the statue in Refuge. Looking over how the red robe seems to look exactly like Magnus. Magnus is a red robe should be screaming in Merle’s head but for whatever reason, he just can’t come up with such a conclusion.

“What does, what does this mean?” Merle asks.

“I don’t know,” Magnus says, his voice low, “I swear to Pan I don’t know.”

~*~*~*~

Taako and Kravitz open the doors to the eternal stockade with a loud bang, followed closely by the Hunger’s horde. The duo rushes into the walls and hastily make an effort to close the large doors as quickly as possible. They manage to get it mostly closed before the Hunger’s minions start pushing up against the doors desperately, reaching in their arms like feral zombies, the sound of their furious splashing about ringing throughout the building.

Taako and Kravitz are desperately pushing up against the doors, fighting the strength of the Hunger and getting dangerously close to losing this contest of strength. There are long inky arms reaching in through the gap and clawing tar onto Taako and Kravitz’s arms in futile attempts to grasp onto them.

Slowly, the doors start opening again as more and more silhouettes start pushing against it, Kravitz grunting as he tries to push back onto the door with more force. The once mostly closed doors were opening more and more, some figures having slid their full torsos through the gap.

Seemingly out of nowhere, a large, ghostly, skeletal hand pushes against the doors, closing them fully with ease. The figures that had poked in through the doors were cut off from whatever body part made it through, the bits on the floor immediately dissolving.

Without hesitating Kravitz runs his scythe between the two doors, locking the door up again. Although the doors are secured, the Hunger can still be heard knocking furiously on the door, the sound of liquid fists splashing on the doors with malice.

Kravitz was panting, exhausted from the chase and leaning on his scythe for support. Taako showed no signs of exhaustion since he was dead-dead and not living-dead. Instead, Taako looked like he didn’t even break a sweat. Taako walked over to help Kravitz from collapsing, gently moving Kravitz’ body to lean on his instead of the scythe.

Legion, the large spectral skeleton that had just saved their asses was now disbanded, each soul rearranging themselves back into their individual self. Standing at the front of the new crowd was Maureen Miller.

“It’s here, isn’t it?” Maureen asks, “the Hunger is here?”

“Y-yeah,” Taako says, using a free hand to grab his forehead, “it’s still so confusing to me.”

“W-wait,” Kravitz says as he straightens himself out, keeping a hand on Taako’s shoulder, “have you two seen this thing before?

“I haven’t, not directly of course,” Maureen says, “but Taako has, I’ve seen his story. It’s what killed me after all.”

“Don’t point any fingers at me just yet, doc,” Taako says, “my memory isn’t entirely fixed, I don’t know everything yet.”

“What do you remember so far?” Kravitz asks, “any ideas on why you forgot in the first place?”

“I… I remember that thing out there is called the Hunger and I remembered something about Two suns,” Taako explains, “I don’t entirely understand it yet but--”

Taako is interrupted by the sound of water pouring, every soul in the room looks to the now leaking door, the Hunger finally squeezing in through every crack in the door rather slowly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote this chapter last night at around midnight. I might need to postpone next week's update so I can catch up by writing ahead of a few chapters. Thanks for reading folks ^_^


	8. Getting Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Magnus and Merle chat with some friends
> 
> ~*~*~*~
> 
> Taako fixes something

When Magnus and Merle, both red-eyed from crying, emerge from the pocket spa they see the liches are hovering by where the animus bell is, talking to each other with an immense amount of static with small, audible words peppered in. When the sound of the pocket spa door shrinking back down to size one of the Red Robes turns their attention to the two living.

 

“Speak of the devil,” the Red Robe says, recognizably the lich from the umbrastaff, “we were just talking about you.”

 

“Oh, really?” Magnus asks in a sarcastic tone, “I literally couldn’t tell.”

 

“Yeah, that’s,” the other Red Robe sighs, “that’s something we’re going to need to fix.”

 

“How do we fix it then?” Merle asks, “what’s even causing this stupid static!”

 

“One step at a time,” the Red Robe cautions, “let’s just deal with the bell first.”

 

“Okay,” Magnus sighs as he marches over to where the bell lays.

 

Without hesitating, Magnus bends over and picks up the bell in his hand, staring it down intensely.

 

“Hello,” the bell greets, “how would you… like to live forever?” 

 

“I’d fucking hate it,” Magnus tells it, malice dripping from his voice, “shut up the hell up.”

 

Magnus doesn’t wait for its response as he violently shoves the Animus Bell into his bag of holding, tired of seeing the relic. After all, it’s pretty much the weapon that killed Taako.

 

As Magnus closes the bag, everyone in the room feels a fierce wind flow through the room violently, knocking down the mannequins in the audience. The wind knocks down the lights and blows away the twin lich’s collection of black roof on the roof. Even the building itself is being swept away by this wind, turning all of Wonderland into a deafening black windstorm that surrounds everyone. Suddenly the windstorm turns upwards, revealing nothing but Wonderland’s wounded victims. Wonderland itself is nowhere to be seen, not a single billboard was left on the paths.

 

Soon after, Magnus feels a hand on his shoulder and is healed a significant amount causing him to turn around and look at Antonia.

 

“Rough day?” Antonia asks.

 

“Like you wouldn’t believe,” Magnus sighs.

 

“You all did a good job… assuming you were the folks who saved us from that hellhole,” Antonia praises.

 

“Thanks,” Magnus sighs.

 

“Hey,” Rowan says as he approaches Magnus and Antonia, “good to see you’re okay, buddy.”

 

“Good to see your okay as well,” Magnus retaliates.

 

“Where’s, uh,” Rowan doesn’t finish that sentence when he sees Magnus’ already tired face sink further down into a frown.

 

“I’m sorry, for your loss, he seemed like a great guy,” Rowan says as he pats Magnus’ shoulder.

 

Meanwhile, Lord Artemis Sterling approaches Merle with a theoretical hat in his hand.

 

“Merle,” Sterling says, interrupting himself to let out a breath of air, “I made a terrible mistake in that place and it’s what I’m gonna have to live with for the rest of my days. I was the one who chose to forsake you in the first round. I-I knew I was sending you all to certain doom and I didn’t care. And… well, that’s not very lordly of me, was it?”

 

“And I’m sorry for the apparent loss of your friend,” Sterling says, taking note of the missing elf, “and there’s no way I could ever,  _ ever, _ apologize sincerely enough for that but I vow to you that someday I will use my considerable power to try to make some effort to make it up to you.” 

 

Merle sighs, patting Sterling on the hip  (since that’s as high as Merle can reach).

 

“It wasn’t your fault, pal,” Merle says, “but I might still take you up on that offer later on.”

 

“Come on,” the not-umbrella Red Robe coaxes, “we need to get going, the sun’s going down and we need to-”

 

The Red Robe is interrupted by the sound of Magnus’ stone of farspeech, cueing the words of Angus Mcdonald.

 

“Sirs?” He nervously greets, “sirs, please, are you there? Your signals were lost but now that w-we’ve found them Ta- Taako’s not picking up! Please, sirs, let us know you’re there!”

 

It’s obvious that Angus is tearing up, trying so desperately to get them to respond, to know that all three of them are okay. Magnus has no idea how to tell Angus that Taako was never going to pick up the stone.

 

“Shit,” the Red Robe mutters as his outstretches his hand to them, “I-I know you two probably want to update them about Taako but that can wait for later.”

 

“Yeah,” the other Red Robe says, “right now we need to go off the grid for just a bit.”

 

Magnus sighs, looking down at Angus’ ID on the call. Merle’s already grumbling and handing his stone over to the Red Robe with their hand out. Magnus, however, feels like he should say something, anything, to calm Angus down. But what could he say? The poor kid’s mentor was dead now. Magnus didn’t feel like breaking the news just yet.

 

When Magnus gives the Red Robe his stone, his heart breaks a little when the Red Robe crushes them in his hand.

 

“We really need to get going now,” the Red Robe says, “we don’t have long before shit goes further south than it’s already gone.”

 

**~*~*~*~**

 

“Shit, shit,  _ shit, _ ” Taako mutters, watching as the tar that’s leaked into the Stockade is now forming hands that wave around frantically, hoping to grab something, “we need to get out of here!”

 

“Don’t have to tell me twice!” Kravitz exclaims as he draws his scythe up and slices it down through the air, resulting in nothing happening.

 

“Shit,” Kravitz mutters, looking over the blade to see if there’s anything unusual on it, “I’m not getting a portal open!”

 

“Are there any other exits to this place?” Taako asks in a panicked tone.

 

“There’s only the one door,” Kravitz says, “I’m afraid a portal or teleportation would be our only way out of here.”

 

“Then let’s put some batteries in your scythe,” Taako says, “any idea what’s causing the problem?”

 

“It’s my powers, ever since the astral plane got flooded the Raven Queen hasn’t been answering me,” Kravitz explains, “she’s my source of power and if I can’t get in contact with her then my abilities are null.”

 

“Then we need a new source of power,” Taako says.

 

The Hunger is growing faster, the arms that have leaked in are now forming fully fledged bodies. Taako turns his attention to Maureen.

 

“Okay doc, we might need you and your pals to help hold them back,” Taako requests.

 

“Trust me, if you help us out now I can see what I can do to help all of your sentences,” Kravitz promises.

 

“You’ve got it, boys,” Maureen says, giving them a thumbs up as she turns to face the other souls in the room, telling them all to pile up.

 

All of the souls obey, mostly out of fear of the inky beasts, and they all converge into the large, phantasmal skeleton only known as Legion. Legion crawls over Kravitz and Taako and starts whacking at the intruding Hunger Minions, effectively keeping them at bay for now.

 

“Okay, babe,” Taako says as he puts his hands on the scythe’s handles, “let’s see if we can get this thing to charge up!”

 

As Taako channels a spell into the scythe, casting Magic Weapon onto it, Kravitz looks over to where Legion is keeping the door closed, only to realize the door isn’t exactly  _ closed _ . The Hunger had gotten it wide open and Legion was doing everything in their power to keep the silhouettes at bay. However, Legion was being overrun and the Hunger had managed to get a few smaller races and animalistic figures through, all of which were charging at the duo with frustration.

 

Taako’s spell wears off as soon as he loses concentration, looking over at the approaching mob.

 

“Son of a bitch,” Taako mutters, “we need to get more distance, this spell requires some level of concentration.”

 

“You’ve got it, love,” Kravitz says as he grabs Taako by the hand and starts running away, their fleeing now much faster thanks to the dry ground beneath them. The Hunger isn’t nearly as fast as it was before but as more of it starts to leak in it’s starts getting faster, thankfully a process slowed down by Legion.

 

“Okay, on the count of three, I’m going to turn your scythe magical and you’re going to get a portal open as quickly as possible!” Taako shouts as takes his hand from Kravitz’ and holding onto the Scythe with both hands, “ready?”

 

“Ready,” Kravitz confirms, coming to a stop and holding onto the scythe from behind Taako.

 

The Hunger is picking up the pace as Taako counts down, Legion desperately running to whack the majority of them away from Taako and Kravitz.

 

“One! Two! Three!” Taako shouts as he closes his eyes and casts Magic Weapon one last time.

 

Kravitz guides both of their hands to raise the scythe up and bring it down,  channelling Taako’s magic into opening a rift to some recognizable souls. At the same time, Taako feels something grab onto his ankle.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OH BOY! This is probably the longest chapter yet haha! Like a whole 500 extra words. See you, folks, next week!


	9. Reunion Tour, Now With More Reunions!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Red Robes are having a heart-to-heart before being interrupted.

They walk in a deafening silence, the two liches floating hand-in-hand and leading the party while Merle and Magnus follow not too far behind. Their path is uneventful with the exception of Magnus and Merle occasionally sidestepping a bolt of untamed magic from one of the liches, most likely the umbrastaff one, and the lich then apologizing profusely. None of them were over it. Taako was gone and they were all trying to hold it together, the liches desperately so.

 

“Don’t worry,” the first Red Robe says to the umbrella Red Robe after another bolt of energy whips off of them, quietly enough so Magnus and Merle can’t hear, “we can get him back.”

 

“I know,” the other sighs, “but what if it doesn’t work out. So many fucking things can go wrong and if we mess up then we’re  _ all _ gone.”

 

“I’m not going to let that happen.  _ We _ aren’t going to let that happen.”

 

“I trust you, babe, but I’m still completely unsure about all of this. I’m willing to go along with whatever you have planned but I don’t see myself as being very useful in this state.”

 

As the second Red Robe speaks their form gets more unstable, prompting the other one to wrap an arm around their shoulders and pull them in close to soothe them.

 

“I’m just happy to have you back. Just you being here with us is enough to keep me motivated for another century,” the Red Robe says, “no matter what happens tomorrow I’m not losing you again.”

 

“Never again,  **bear.** ”

 

Suddenly, both the Red Robes, Merle, and Magnus, are startled by a surprisingly loud sound of what sounded like a piece of paper, Merle and Magnus raising their weapons and the liches gathering magical energies into their palms. The first Red Robe points to something mysterious about 10 feet in front of them on the path.

 

“There!” The Red Robe exclaims, successfully bringing all of their attention to the possible threat.

 

It looked like the tip of a large, curved knife, was floating in the air steadily, a small purple aura surrounding it. Suddenly it moved further, revealing more of the supposed blade and cutting the world deeper and creating that sound of ripping paper again. Magnus lifts up his shield and goes to stand in front of the party, silently motioning them all behind him.

 

Finally, the blade cuts in even further and slides down smoothly, revealing a look into the astral plane.

 

Merle and Magnus see Kravitz, standing on the other side of the portal with his scythe in hand and panic across his face, panting heavily and tired. Legion is in the background performing wild fighting tactics at seemingly nothing.

 

The two Red Robes, however, see something much more eventful.

 

From the liches point of view not only do they see the reaper and Legion but they also see the Hunger’s minions and most importantly,  _ Taako  _ is there too _! _ The Hunger’s minions have surrounded the two, Legion barely visible from behind the Hunger’s crowd. Kravitz and Taako have inky hands gripped onto them, desperately trying to pull them back in. Kravitz seemingly has more hands on him, being the Hunger’s main point of interest, but is still able to grab onto Taako’s hand and leap through the portal.

 

Sadly, the Hunger manages to keep enough hands on Taako that he isn’t pulled across planes with Kravitz. Instead, their hands are holding through the portal as the Hunger grabs onto the rift and starts pulling it shut, risking Taako to be lost as Kravitz keeps trying to pull Taako into the material plane.

 

Merle and Magnus watch with confusion and helplessness, unable to see the imposing threats of the Hunger and unable to see why Kravitz is struggling to pull something out from the portal like a surprise mime show.

 

That’s when the liches’ magic comes in. Both the Red Robes start firing at the figures holding onto Taako, each silhouette reverting back into liquid as they’re struck by fireballs and pure necrotic energy.

 

Kravitz falls back as Taako is finally able to jump through the portal, causing Kravitz to fall back onto the ground and Taako accidentally comes crashing down right onto him just moments before the Hunger's minions pulled the rift closed.

 

“What the  _ fuck _ just happened,” Magnus asks, lowering his shield and weapons down finally.

 

“Y-you didn’t see it?” Kravitz asks, gently moving Taako off of his chest so he can sit up, Taako rolling himself over so he was sitting up next to Kravitz.

 

“We didn’t see jackshit!” Merle exclaims, “just you and that big ol’ ghost skeleton in the background.”

 

“Wait, so you don’t see-?!” Kravitz is interrupted by the umbrella-lich, who tackles Taako’s spirit joyfully.

 

“TAAKO!” The Red Robe exclaims at the top of their nonexistent lungs, holding Taako in a tight hug.

 

Taako doesn’t have much time to react, he’s speechless at the moment. He probably should’ve screamed with surprise but this was just too… familiar.

 

_ Taako blinks his eyes but instead of his eyes opening afterwards they stay closed, his eyelids showing him another vision of the past. This time Taako was on a silver ship, surrounded by 6 people wearing red clothing, and he had just woken up standing on his feet. _

 

_ He hadn’t been sleeping. He remembers he was dead but for the moment he doesn’t quite remember how. In his memory, it feels like he was gone for a few seconds but something in his gut told him it had been much longer than that since he died early in that last cycle. _

 

_ “Taako!” _

 

_ Almost immediately, one of them wrapped their arms around him and held him as close as possible, burying their- no- her face into his shoulder. _

 

_ “Don’t you  _ _ ever _ _ do that again, Doofus,” Lup said, starting to tear up slightly as she buried her face even further into his shoulder. _

 

_ The rest of their crew was also surrounding the twins now, making sure their friends were okay. _

 

_ “I wasn’t planning on it, Goofus,” Taako said as he wrapped his arms around her as well, refusing to let go at all. _

 

When Taako snaps back into reality, his sister is holding him at arm's length with a worried expression, despite expressions being tough to notice in their lich forms. Another Red Robe is also looking over her shoulder to see him more clearly while Kravitz is motioning Merle and Magnus to where Taako is and seemingly explaining that, yes, Taako is there despite him being invisible to them.

 

“Taako, are you okay?” Lup asks.

 

Taako doesn’t hesitate to pull Lup back in for another hug, holding her as tight as possible. Lup immediately responds by wrapping her arms around Taako and for  _ once  _ since her escape from the umbrella she’s finally stable, no longer haunted by the thought of losing him forever because her brother was right here in her arms. Sure, he might be dead, but she was too.

 

The other red robe comes by as well to pull both the twins into a hug, happy to see both of them together and happy again after 12 whole years of being apart from one another. Barry was overjoyed that his family was almost back together again. Almost.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hmmm... I don't really think I have anything witty to put in this section today. Guess I'll just remind you folks to go follow me on Tumblr at https://salty-angel.tumblr.com/ and to keep an eye out for my upcoming fics as well as next week's update!
> 
> Thank you all for being amazing and leaving such generous comments and kudos! It really makes me indescribably happy to see your feedback!


	10. The Joy Before The Storm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The undead come to an understanding  
> The living just want a hug god damn it.

“Where have you been?” Taako asks as he holds Lup out at arm's length to look at her, “I- we- we looked everywhere for you!”

“I know,” Lup says, glancing over to Barry as well, “I know you did.”

“It’s great to have you both back,“ Barry says, smiling softly, again an expression almost unrecognizable in his lich form, and floats up to a somewhat standing position. He looks up from the twins to look at the other three. Magnus, Merle, and- oh yeah that’s a fucking reaper.

A visible sudden chill runs down Barry in the form of small glitches running down his body when he realizes that the grim reaper is there. Kravitz was watching the scene play out with confusion and suspicion on his face and his scythe held close to him just in case. Now he’s looking at Barry in whatever passes as his eyes in his lich form, still trying to determine what to do.

Taako and Lup look over to see the two staring at each other with uncertainty and tension, Barry and Kravitz both waiting for the other to drop the ball. Kravitz catches Taako’s face at the corner of his eye and how Taako’s expression quickly goes grim, worried about this interaction.

Kravitz but help but feel his heart sink into his stomach when he sees Taako look so distressed at him. He sighs and brings his scythe down, letting his muscles relax and nervously smiles at the lich.

“S-sorry,” Kravitz apologizes, “I’m just… a little on edge I guess.” He looks over at Taako and his nervous smile turns a little more genuine before looking back at Barry. “But, if Taako trusts you, then I’m sure we can come to an agreement.”

“Y-yeah, today’s been a little hectic I guess, and sorry to say this but it’s only going to get worse tomorrow,” Barry says as he extends a skeletal hand, “the name’s Barry.”

“Bluejeans, right? I think I recognize the name,” Kravitz says, his smile deteriorating back to nervous as he accepts the handshake, “I’m Kravitz.”

“Ch-Charmed.”

“Excuse me?” Magnus says, hoping to get the undead’s attention, “where exactly is Taako right now?”

“Oh,” Lup says, hovering up to a standing position and gesture to where Taako is now standing next to her, “he’s right here, babe.”

“O-okay, uh,” Magnus says as he turns to the seemingly empty space, “Taa-”

Magnus is interrupted by his dwarven companion, who doesn't hesitate to run up to where Taako presumably is, wrapping his arms around the empty air.

“We thought you were gone,” Merle cries, “wh-what the hell were you thinking!”

Taako can’t help but chuckle slightly, patting his transparent hand on Merle’s head, whose arms are slightly off so one goes right through Taako’s spectral leg.

“Lup, can you tell him that I, uh… that I wasn’t thinking at all, I guess?” Taako requests, still awkwardly patting Merle’s head and trying not to let his hand phase right through it.

“Okay--” Lup nods as she turns to look at Merle “--Taako says, and I quote word-for-word, I’m an idiot who wasn’t thinking properly.”

“HEY!” Taako exclaims, dramatically swatting his hand at her, “that is not word-for-word!”

“Okay, okay,” Lup chuckles, batting Taako’s hands away from her, “I may have done some improvision.”

“Mhm, for sure,” Taako agrees, turning to look at Kravitz. “Hey, babe! Think you can do the translating for me?”

“Oh, of course!” Kravitz accepts as he walks over to be next to Taako.

“Wait…” Barry says, taking a second to think about what he just witnessed. “You… hm… y… yoU’RE DATING THE GRIM REAPER?!”

Lup bursts out laughing at Barry’s surprise, doubling over with laughter. Taako is also chuckling at Barry’s outburst before seeing how embarrassed Kravitz is, which only gets him giggling even louder. Magnus and Merle also chuckle a bit, despite only seeing three-quarters of the exchange that just happened.

“Alright,” Kravitz says, trying to shake away his blush, “what do you need me to say?”

“Just, tell them that’s it’s good to be back,” Taako says as he takes Kravitz’ hand as a way to help relax Kravitz.

“Okay--” Kravitz turns to Magnus and Merle “--Taako says it’s good to be back.”

“Knew I could trust you,” Taako says as he gives Kravitz a peck on the cheek before glaring daggers at Lup, “unlike some people.”

Lup just smiles and shrugs innocently.

Magnus steps forward as his eyes start welling up

“T-Taako,” Magnus chokes out, wiping away tears and pretending they weren’t there, “I'm so, so fucking sorry. You shouldn’t have died, you didn’t have to sacrifice your life like that! I was the one who got bad luck, not you!”

Taako sighs, leaning his weight onto Kravitz for comfort and squeezing his hand.

“Tell Magnus, it’s not his fault. It was my decision and that there’s nothing he could’ve done to change that.”

Kravitz repeats Taako’s words exactly, sounding uncertain considering this is his first look at how Taako had died this time. Taakojust averts his gaze away from Kravitz.

“I’ll tell you about it later,” Taako says grimly, resting his head on Kravitz’ shoulder.

“Whenever you’re ready,” Kravitz’ whispers to him, “take your time.”

“Look, I know I can’t really, make contact with you,” Magnus says, “but at our earliest convenience I am going to give you the biggest fucking hug, Taako.”

“Tell Maggie I look forward to it.”

“Taako can’t wait for it.”

“Okay,” Taako says, ”I guess that works too.”

“Oh!” Lup exclaims with faux shock, “so he’s allowed to make improvisions!”

“Last time I checked he didn’t throw in an insult,” Taako says, jokingly sticking his tongue out to his sister.

“I was simply tossing in a known fact, Koko,” Lup insists.

“Ouch, Lulu, you wound me,” Taako says sarcastically, holding his chest with fake pain.

“Oh! Oh!” Merle exclaims as he remembers something, “we’ve got your body in the pocket spa, maybe you can jump back in there!”

Taako lights up at the idea of getting his body back but he looks over to the two Red Robes and that light in his eye slowly fades away.

“I’d love to but… maybe later. I’m not done with these memories yet.”

“He says not yet, he just wants some more time with his memories,” Kravitz explains.

“Taako, you have no idea how much I want to talk but you can’t stay dead forever, we’re going to need you in your body sooner or later,” Barry explains.

“I-I know that, but we still have until tomorrow right?”

“Yeah, okay, tomorrow morning we can push you back into your body,” Barry explains,” but until then we have a lot of catching up to do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't forget to come to yell at me either in the comment section or at my Tumblr, salty-angel!

**Author's Note:**

> I didn't beta read this and turned it into a draft at, like, midnight last night. Please do either roast my writing or praise it. I'll appreciate it either way.


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